Dear Baha'i friends,
The goal of the Five Year Plan to establish six new Publishing Trusts is by now known to you; these new publishing agencies are to be established in Australia, the Fiji Islands, Japan, Korea, the Philippines and Malaysia.
We have just sent to these six National Spiritual Assemblies the attached Memorandum on Establishing and Operating a Baha'i Publishing Trust, together with our Memorandum of 28 March 1971. We now enclose both these memoranda solely for your information. It is possible that some of the six National Spiritual Assemblies charged with this goal may apply to any one of you for information about the structure and operation of your own publishing agency and we feel sure you will answer any questions they may ask.
With loving Baha'i greetings,
The Universal House of Justice
May 1974
The name "Baha'i Publishing Trust" does not require the establishment of a Trust in the legal sense, and, in fact, more than one Baha'i publishing agency is not called a Trust.
By whatever name it is called the objective is to establish a publishing agency, under the complete control and direction of the National Spiritual Assembly.
The difference between a Baha'i Publishing Trust and any other Committee of the National Spiritual Assembly lies chiefly in the fact that the publishing agency does not operate on a budget from the National Spiritual Assembly but is established as a business with its own capital (whose sources are listed at 6 below), trading in the publishing and sale of Baha'i literature and allied items, and the results of this trading remain within its own financial structure. It is a business, owned by the National Spiritual Assembly, to carry out its publishing requirements.
While it may first be set up as a Committee the aim should be to form some association, legally established, by which the National Spiritual Assembly may act as a publisher. This may be achieved either through the National Spiritual Assembly's own incorporation or by the establishment of a separate legal entity with the National Spiritual Assembly having full control. But in any case legal advice must be sought.
The Company or Trust must be a non-profit-making organization, that is to say all proceeds from its transactions must be used for such things as paying salaries and other operational expenses, royalties and interests on loans and augmenting its own capital. It is not operated for individual profit
.Capitalization
Since the agency is to be operated solely for Baha'i
purposes, capital funds may not be received from non-Baha'is, although of
course the aim is to sell books to the largest possible public. Capital may be
obtained from:
a) Grants from the National Spiritual Assembly
b) Gifts
from individual Baha'is or from Spiritual Assemblies
c) Profit
from trading
d) Loans
from Baha'is or Baha'i institutions. Such loans may be interest free or
interest bearing but for every loan there must be a written contract setting
out the terms of the loan, its duration, condition of repayment and all
details.
e) Taking
over any publishing assets (stock, outstanding accounts, etc.) which your
National Spiritual Assembly or one of your Committees may at present have.
Production
Publishing is not the same as printing or manufacturing
books. The publisher engages manufacturing firms to produce his books according
to the publisher's design and specifications. The actual production and
distribution of books need not be confined to the country in which the
Publishing Trust operates. The printing and binding may be done anywhere it is
deemed most feasible economically, and from the point of view of control,
quality, economy and financial arrangements.
Publishing programme
Baha'i literature comprises in general the Sacred Text
(works of Baha'u'llah, the Bab, 'Abdu'l-Baha); the Guardian's writings; letters
and publications of the Universal House of Justice; introductory and
explanatory works; historical works; teaching pamphlets and other teaching
literature. The purpose of establishing Baha'i publishing agencies throughout
the world is to make a wide range of such material available to everybody.
The specific programme you must devise will therefore take into consideration the following factors:
a) What are the prevailing languages in your area of jurisdiction.
b) Will
other National Spiritual Assemblies be interested in your publications.
c) What are
your immediate needs for teaching and study of the Faith.
d) What
literature useful to you already exists.
e) Reviewing.
Under
a) You will
need to consider a programme of translation and we refer you to our Memorandum
of 28 March 1971
b) If the
answer is yes, you will need to consult any such National Spiritual Assembly
with a view to establishing priorities and enlisting their help in translating.
c) Together
with b) and d) should enable you to establish a publishing programme by
priority of need.
d) If you
can, with reasonable ease, obtain needed literature from other Baha'i
Publishing Trusts you should obviously do so and use your own resources for
publishing items not available elsewhere. Your own publishing agency should buy
such material at wholesale prices and re-sell it to Local Spiritual Assemblies
and individuals.
e) Everything
published must be approved; see our Memorandum of 28 March 1971
Financial Programme
An appeal may be made to all the believers under your
jurisdiction, as well as to any National Spiritual Assemblies under 8 b) above,
to support the new publishing agency. In addition to such an appeal a general
invitation to the friends may be issued to take up loans, see 6 d) above.
Proper accounts must be kept and a Profit and Loss Account and a Balance Sheet drawn up and audited every year.
Pricing of publications. Two objectives have to be balanced against each other, namely, to make Baha'i literature available at as low a price as possible and to build up a sound business. Retail prices will have to cover
a) production costs
b) operating
expenses (see 5)
c) discounts
allowed
d) a small
profit to repay loans and build up capital.
Postage on books. Cost of postage or freight may either be charged directly to the customer or included in the selling price.
If the National Spiritual Assembly wishes to sell a book at less than the commercial retail price, it should subsidize its Publishing Trust so that the Trust itself will incur no loss.
Management
The Publishing Trust should be managed by a Committee,
appointed by your National Spiritual Assembly and directly responsible to you.
Ideally it should have in its membership one believer capable of acting as
general manager and conducting the business of the Trust on behalf of the
Committee. At the outset it may not be possible to make this a full-time
position or to offer a salary to the manager, but this point should be borne in
mind as the business of the Trust increases and its volume of sales justifies
such an expense. Perhaps it may be possible to find some competent believer
who, for the present, would make the management of the Publishing Trust his or
her Baha'i service.
The above are not hard and fast rules but guidelines for consideration. The important thing is to tackle at once the problem of supplying literature to support the all-important work of teaching and study of the Cause. The Sacred Text, the Guardian's writings, expository and historical works are all essential to the propagation and promotion of the Faith.
(Messages from the Universal House of Justice, ‘1963-1986’)
